Doris Day: an introduction 

Edited version of LLoyd K Jessen's introduction to his as yet
unpublished book "The Complete Doris Day"

Doris Day was an ordinary person who possessed extraordinary talent and an innate ability to entertain people and make them feel good. She was one of our country’s top female movie stars and one of the greatest singers of all time.
She was beautiful enough to be a model; disciplined enough to be a teacher; content enough to be a wife, mother, and homemaker; and simple enough to be just an everyday person. But her talent for singing and acting was so great that she was destined to become one of the world’s most popular entertainers.

Doris Day was the only female star who was a superstar in five mediums: live big bands, radio, recording, films and television. Her screen persona, that of an intelligent, wholesome woman of unfailing optimism and understated strength of character came to epitomize the ideal American woman of the 1950s. The introduction to a Warner Brothers collection of eight Doris Day videos released in 1996 sums it up pretty well: “The singing...the dancing...the legend...she had a love affair with the whole world.”

Many older persons have fond memories of Doris Day due to movies like Pillow Talk and That Touch of Mink, but younger people know very little, if anything, about her. The wide range of her recordings is unappreciated by most people. The story of her life, greatly at odds with the cheerful life she depicted on-screen, is enlightening. Her personal philosophy is inspiring. Her determination is legendary.

Despite the fact that she’s been gone from the celebrity spotlight for a long time, a large and devoted group of fans worldwide has kept her films and recordings in demand. She has had an especially loyal following in Europe. In 1991, a book about Doris Day written by Eric Braun was published in England. It was re-issued by Orion Publishers in 1998. Between 1993 and 1997, Bear Family Records of Hambergen, Germany released four boxed sets of compact discs containing all of her work as a solo artist for Columbia Records recorded between 1947 and 1967. Her final album, recorded in 1967 but forgotten for 25 years, was released in Great Britain in 1994. Various recording companies have continued to release new compilations of her songs on audio cassettes and CDs. Many of her movies are shown on cable television and are also available on home video.

 

An article in the September 3, 1995, issue of USA Today said: “The '90s woman has been reborn in the image of Doris Day, the quintessential good girl of mid-century America." In the May 11, 1998, issue of People Weekly, Doris Day was featured in an article titled “The Girls Next Door! More Fun Than Femme Fatale, They’re The Women We Love - And Like, Too.” On October 18, 1998, Doris' life story was told in a new, two-hour episode of A&E Biography. Fan clubs in England, Australia, and the United States continue to celebrate her life and work. And the Doris Day Animal League, a citizens’ lobbying organization, continues to focus public attention on animal rights and welfare.

“The truth is you are not only a great singer and actress but truly a quintessential American artist.” - Will Friedwald to Doris Day

Someone once said “no matter what Doris Day does, she spreads good cheer.” Her dual legacy as a performing artist and a humanitarian proves it. It includes more than 180 hours of audio and video recordings: 80+ hours of television shows and appearances, 67 hours of movies, 32+ hours of studio recordings, and many recorded radio performances. It also includes countless hours of work lovingly done on behalf of pets and animals everywhere, from the simple act of rescuing strays to the founding of a national animal welfare organization in 1987, the Doris Day Animal League.

 

At the end of the 1998 A&E Biography of Doris Day, Peter Graves called her “a gifted professional who has left a significant and enduring legacy  one which has earned her a reputation as one of the greatest performers of the 20 th century.” Producer Don Genson added “I think the whole world is in love with Doris Day. It’s a love affair that’s never going to end. And that’s quite a legacy.”

At least a dozen books have been written about her. She told her life story to A.E. Hotchner in a candid autobiography published in 1975 titled Doris Day - Her Own Story. She has been featured in hundreds of magazines worldwide over the past 50 years.

Doris Day is the type of person who always gives credit where credit is due. Her greatest supporters, of course, were her mother, Alma, whom Doris affectionately called Nana, and her son, Terry Melcher. They were followed by countless others: film producers and directors, writers, photographers, choreographers, co-stars, cast members, editors, and crew; music directors, composers, writers, arrangers, and conductors; costumers, hair designers, and makeup artists; agents, publicists, promoters, and critics; and last, but definitely not least, the public who adored her.

 

Her’image’, a word that Doris Day dislikes, has always been that of the pretty, perky, freckle-faced blonde who could act, sing and dance, and make you feel good inside. In 1963, movie critic Pauline Kael described her as “the all-American middle-aged girl.” But in Doris’s 1975 autobiography and again in a 1989 interview for the British Broadcasting Corporation, she adamantly proclaimed that she was not “Miss Goody-Two-Shoes” or “Miss Happy-Go-Lucky.”

Doris has said that her image “has nothing to do with the life I’ve had.” Putting images and stereotypes aside, this book is meant to guide the reader through her many pursuits while celebrating and honoring the remarkable life that this great lady from Cincinnati has had.

And she is, of course, one of Cincinnati’s most famous citizens. It’s a distinction she holds along with astronaut Neil Armstrong and Cincinnati Reds baseball player Pete Rose. She’s also a member of the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame, an honor she shares with sharpshooter Annie Oakley, silent-screen star Lillian Gish, comedienne Phyllis Diller, feminist Gloria Steinem, and other notables.

Actress Charlotte Greenwood once told Doris Day “Your strength is in your simplicity.” The simplicity to which Ms. Greenwood and others referred does, in fact, follow the dictionary definition: freedom from complexity, absence of pretentiousness, naturalness, and sincerity.

In the book, Doris Day - Her Own Story, James Cagney said: "The touchstone is simplicity, the simple line of performance, directly to you, uncluttered. That’s true of everything - writing, painting, music - that’s the rare thing, to strip away all that is fake and artificial. Not a trace of ham. Someone asked me to define “ham” and I said when you overlard something, whatever way you overlard it - whether a thing is overpainted, overworded, whatever. So what Doris has, and all the good ones have, is the ability to project the simple, direct statement of a simple, direct idea without cluttering it."

 

Many of us know the reel Doris Day. But few of us know the real person. The real Doris Day is not the movie star, singer and fashion icon that we are most familiar with. Instead, she is a rather shy woman who prefers to spend her time riding her bicycle, walking along the beach, enjoying time with family and friends, rescuing stray animals, caring for her pets, and promoting animal rights and welfare. Today she is content to have a very private life far away from the demands of the camera and the microphone.

The film reviewer Hollis Alpert once wrote: No one has ever asked me to choose the typical American beauty, but if I were asked I think I’d bypass Marilyn Monroe, Kim Novak, Elizabeth Taylor, and Sheree North. I’d pick Doris Day...she’s authentic. She’s the girl every guy should marry. Marilyn Monroe? Elizabeth Taylor? Kim Novak? They’d all be trouble. Doris Day would be true-blue, understanding, direct, honest, and even a little sexy. You can trust her in any situation.

In the prologue to Doris Day - Her Own Story, author A.E. Hotchner described his first meeting with Doris during the summer of 1973 as follows: Doris arrived fifteen minutes late on a chariot of sunshine. Kitsch metaphor or not, that exactly describes her entrance as she came striding into the garden, yellow sweater, beige slacks, yellow straw hat perched on the back of her blond hair, glowing skin, an aura of buoyant euphoria playing off her. The luncheon guests looked up from their tables...and you could feel a sort of mass positive response to her smiling, striding presence.

 

Doris Day has had many names. She was born Doris Mary Anne Kappelhoff. Her schoolmates called her Kappy. When she began singing, band leader Barney Rapp persuaded her to change her name to Doris Day following her early success with the song “Day After Day.” Following her entry into films, people on the movie sets called her Nora Neat and Dorothy Detail. Some people called her Dee Dee. Her son and many others called her Dodo. Her brother called her Doke. Billy DeWolfe named her Clara Bixby. Rock Hudson called her Eunice. Charlotte Greenwood called her Emma. Doris has said that she liked all of her nicknames better than her professional name ‘Doris Day’.

It’s a name that she shares with at least 67 other women in the U.S. who currently live in 28 states and the District of Columbia. Four happen to live in Doris’s home state of Ohio, in the cities of Dayton, Ironton, Kettering, and Ripley.

Regardless of her name, her persona has always been difficult to disguise. In her book, Doris revealed “I once went to a Broadway musical wearing a black wig and other disguises, certain that I was going to enjoy an unrecognized evening in the theater, but as I went down the aisle to my seat, the usherette said, ‘Doris Day! What are you doing in that silly wig?’ and that was the end of that.”

Love has played such a big role in Doris’s life and career. Her love for people, animals, and life itself. Our love for her. This is reflected in the fact that the word “love” is part of the title for three of her films, four episodes of her television series, 72 of her songs, and four of her albums. Her final album, recorded in 1967 but not released until 1994, is appropriately titled “The Love Album.”

There has also always been a dream-like quality about Doris Day. The word “dream” is part of the title of two of her films, three of her albums, and 23 of her songs, including “You Stepped Out of a Dream.” By internalizing so many of her love songs, she indeed gave them a dreamy quality that listeners will never forget.